AP currently ranks 33rd on the all-time rushing list, only Steven Jackson is above him on the current players list. With a good season, he'll likely jump to top 25. He is 3rd all-time in yards per game, with 99.4avg.

CJ has 6 80yd runs, no other player has more than 3.

Calvin Johnson is currently averaging more yds per game than any WR in NFL history. At only 27, he already ranks 91st in NFL receiving yards all-time and with a 1000yd season will likely jump to top 65.

Peyton Manning is 72 passing TDs behind Brett Favre for the all-time lead, at least 2 seasons worth. Can he hold on that long? He is also 13000 yards behind Brett in yards, about 3 good years worth.

We are truly eyewitnesses to some of the greatest players the NFL has ever seen.
That's not even getting into the TEs or defensive players because I'm off to bed!

AP currently ranks 33rd on the all-time rushing list, only Steven Jackson is above him on the current players list. With a good season, he'll likely jump to top 25. He is 3rd all-time in yards per game, with 99.4avg.

CJ has 6 80yd runs, no other player has more than 3.

Calvin Johnson is currently averaging more yds per game than any WR in NFL history. At only 27, he already ranks 91st in NFL receiving yards all-time and with a 1000yd season will likely jump to top 65.

Peyton Manning is 72 passing TDs behind Brett Favre for the all-time lead, at least 2 seasons worth. Can he hold on that long? He is also 13000 yards behind Brett in yards, about 3 good years worth.

We are truly eyewitnesses to some of the greatest players the NFL has ever seen.
That's not even getting into the TEs or defensive players because I'm off to bed!

The game has changed so much in the last decade that for me, stats have become meaningless and all the talk about great players is just so much NFL hype to sell their product.

We are never going to be able to compare players from the past to the present as far as stats are concerned, stats have become meaningless in the modern era of sports with performance enhancing drugs and rules that make offense the name of the game today with little balance. The NFL wants wide open football and simply doesn't care that they have changed the way football is played quite significantly to get to their goal. It is all about money today with tradition(s) sold down the drain if it will put 1 more penny in their coffers.

What do you mean they're meaningless now? lol. What did they mean before?

Just because the players have ranks based on their statistical values does not mean that is their rank based on skill. No one is arguing that Jerome Bettis is better than Jim Brown just because he has more yards.

There is however an interesting conversation to be had about what that means. It means Jim Brown played for 9 years and Bettis played for 13. It means Jim Brown averaged 1.4 more yards per a carry than Bettis. It also means Bettis was a pretty durable guy to have such worse per carry stats but still get more yards (by result of playing for 4 more years).

Edit: I'm not trying to start an argument. I realize you said "The game has changed so much in the last decade that for me, stats have become meaningless". I just wanted to point out there is more than just talking about the values to each stats :)

Not sure that I find any current stats that impressive. The problem with just selecting stats and not providing any context or similar comparison is that all they are is stats.

Eric Dickerson first 6 seasons in the league yielded 9915 yards at 110 ypg. he seemed a lock to finish #1 all time then he like most running backs gradually fell of the cliff. Emmitt Smith had 8956 yards after 6 seasons at 96.3 ypg.

So what AP is doing is hardly new in the history of the game. Jim Brown averaged 104.3 ypg over his 118 game career. If AP gets through 10-14 years at the rate he is then it will be truly impressive. History both near and far shows RB tend to slow down quickly.

In your last paragraph you seem to be insinuating, maybe not intentionally that these things have never been seen before but it is simply not true.

Randy Moss had 525 rec for 8375 yards and 77TD's at 16 YPC at 87.5 YPG. Done from 1998-2003.

As good as Megatron is he lags behind Rice/Moss doing what he did 10/20 years ago.

Lance Alworth averaged 93 YPG over the first 6 years of his career, in isolation what does that mean? He must be better than Calvin Johnson right?

Is what Calvin Johnson doing any more astounding than what Don Hutson did in 1935-1945? Who knows it is really hard to quantify but those stats in their day were virtually one of a kind and would have been considered astounding.

To me, yards is a poor indicator now to evaluate a player. Especially QB's and WR's IMO now. Drew Brees has thrown for 5,000 yards 3 times already in his career. Stafford almost did it in back to back years, even though he had a poor year last year.
In 2002, only 4 QB's threw for over 4,000 yards and 22 WR's had over 1,000 receiving yards. 17 RB's rushed for over 1,000 yards.
2012 saw 11 QB's pass for over 4,000 yards, remarkably only 20 WR's had over 1,000 receiving yards though. 16 RB's rushed for over 1,000 yards.

I mean, Matt Hasselbeck ranks 21st right now in career passing yards for a QB to give you an idea of the disparity in yards. Basically, throwing for 4,000 yards years ago was like throwing 5,000 now. Completely different game, and you can't compare guys playing today to guys playing 20 years ago. Can't say "Well, so and so has better numbers than this guy, and he's in the HOF!" Doesn't work.

Is what Peterson doing impressive? Yes, same with Johnson, Manning, Brees, Brady, etc.
I really do remember watching Moss early on thinking, you know what, this guy might challenge Rice's records, but we all know what happened with him.

The game has changed so much in the last decade that for me, stats have become meaningless and all the talk about great players is just so much NFL hype to sell their product.

We are never going to be able to compare players from the past to the present as far as stats are concerned, stats have become meaningless in the modern era of sports with performance enhancing drugs and rules that make offense the name of the game today with little balance. The NFL wants wide open football and simply doesn't care that they have changed the way football is played quite significantly to get to their goal. It is all about money today with tradition(s) sold down the drain if it will put 1 more penny in their coffers.

I agree to some extent, but the fact is also that for core positions, namely RB, they won't ever get the opportunity to play how they did back then. Emmitt Smith wouldn't be the leading rusher in the NFL history if he played in todays NFL. Emmitt was a rare case where he was allowed to become, statistically in terms of yards, the greatest RB to play. He basically got to play an extra 4 seasons, picking up 3200 extra yards at the end of his career.

Not sure that I find any current stats that impressive. The problem with just selecting stats and not providing any context or similar comparison is that all they are is stats.

Eric Dickerson first 6 seasons in the league yielded 9915 yards at 110 ypg. he seemed a lock to finish #1 all time then he like most running backs gradually fell of the cliff. Emmitt Smith had 8956 yards after 6 seasons at 96.3 ypg.

So what AP is doing is hardly new in the history of the game. Jim Brown averaged 104.3 ypg over his 118 game career. If AP gets through 10-14 years at the rate he is then it will be truly impressive. History both near and far shows RB tend to slow down quickly.

In your last paragraph you seem to be insinuating, maybe not intentionally that these things have never been seen before but it is simply not true.

Randy Moss had 525 rec for 8375 yards and 77TD's at 16 YPC at 87.5 YPG. Done from 1998-2003.

As good as Megatron is he lags behind Rice/Moss doing what he did 10/20 years ago.

Lance Alworth averaged 93 YPG over the first 6 years of his career, in isolation what does that mean? He must be better than Calvin Johnson right?

Is what Calvin Johnson doing any more astounding than what Don Hutson did in 1935-1945? Who knows it is really hard to quantify but those stats in their day were virtually one of a kind and would have been considered astounding.

I wasn't really trying to insinuate that some of these things have never been done, but was actually comparing them with the all-time greats. It was late and after reading some comments, I realize that point may not have come across very clearly.

In terms of rushing yards a game, 3 current NFL players (AP, Foster and CJ) are ahead of some all-time greats like Emmitt Smith, OJ Simpson, Earl Campbell. In fact, among the top 15 RBers in YPG, only Terrell Davis and Billy Sims are eligible for the Hall of Fame and not gotten in.

While comparing numbers isn't the greatest comparison, it's really one of the only things we have. You could argue whatever you wanted about the passing game, which I know numbers are highly inflated causing WRs and QBs to put up far more impressive numbers, but the running game has been relatively flat over the years. While it has increased some, I remember when 1000 yards was considered a good season, now it's more like 1200-1300

I wasn't really trying to insinuate that some of these things have never been done, but was actually comparing them with the all-time greats. It was late and after reading some comments, I realize that point may not have come across very clearly.

In terms of rushing yards a game, 3 current NFL players (AP, Foster and CJ) are ahead of some all-time greats like Emmitt Smith, OJ Simpson, Earl Campbell. In fact, among the top 15 RBers in YPG, only Terrell Davis and Billy Sims are eligible for the Hall of Fame and not gotten in.

While comparing numbers isn't the greatest comparison, it's really one of the only things we have. You could argue whatever you wanted about the passing game, which I know numbers are highly inflated causing WRs and QBs to put up far more impressive numbers, but the running game has been relatively flat over the years. While it has increased some, I remember when 1000 yards was considered a good season, now it's more like 1200-1300

I think certainly with AP and Megatron it is likely that when their day is done in the NFL they will be ranked right up there with the greats. What Peterson did this year was nothing short of astounding. The difference between now and 83 when I started watching football is the RB was fundamental to a teams success. Joe Gibbs built his success on a power running game and supplemented it with a trio of dangerous wide receivers. These days the RB's seem almost secondary in importance. It was nice to see Doug Martin, Alfred Morris and to a slightly lesser degree Trent Richardson come in and produce.

The emphasis on the passing game however has caused people to go nuts over yardage though, and it does bother me a bit because it was a lot rarer to pass for 4000 yards 20 years ago and it is now common place. A lot of people equate that to mean that the NFL is better now and that is not necessarily true. So whilst I am thoroughly impressed by what Manning, Brees, Brady and Rodgers are doing year in year out, it isn't so much the yards but the TD's and relatively low turnover ratios they produce. Those are the things that impress me. Those Brady seasons in 2007/2010 seasons standout in particular, 86 TD's against 12 picks is an amazing snapshot of his career, the yards he accumulated are much more commonplace in the NFL.